Published
on Wednesday, December 4, 2013, an article in the New York Times makes note of
the growing importance of mobile payments to India’s lower socioeconomic
classes. The article features a fascinating profile of one user in
Siddharthnagar, a location in rural India, and then discusses the increasing
economic relevance that mobile payments are becoming to India’s poorer
populations.
The
article mentions the most rapidly growing new venture in this scene,
Money-on-Mobile, a now majority owned subsidiary of Calpian, a publicly traded
company that provides to the merchant community an integrated suite of payment
processing services and related software enabling products. The article also
notes that mobile payments in India can grow to $350 billion annually.
Money-on-Mobile is currently supported by over 167,000 retail locations in
India, and has been accessed by over 75 million unique users since its
inception in April 2012. On account of its extensive national population,
across-the-board adoption of mobile phones, and holding of some of the lowest
airtime rates found worldwide, India is emerging as a strong contender for
making South Asia the world’s largest wireless-transfer economy.
Even
though it has been in operation for less than three years, Money-on-Mobile has
been accessed by four times more users than Kenya’s M-Pesa’s own. It is also supported
by twice as many outlets.
Commenting
on the article mention, Calpian President & CEO Harold Montgomery said: “We
are excited to see Money-on-Mobile being recognized by a publication of the
stature of the New York Times. We believe that this article is a reflection of
the rapid increase in use of mobile payments throughout Asia and Africa, and it
is our hope that additional awareness will lead to increased usage and
ultimately significant growth of Calpian’s Money-on-Mobile business.”
Calpian
recently was approved by the Finance Ministry of the Government of India,
through the Foreign Investment Promotion Board, to own up to 74 percent
majority share in Money-on-Mobile. Furthermore, Money-on-Mobile was recently
awarded two prestigious industry awards, The FIPS Award and The Aegis Graham
Bell Award for Innovation, for its offering of exceptional financial services
that benefit India’s developing economy and for its mobile payments innovation.
Money-on-Mobile’s
prepaid payment solution is particularly attractive to less well-to-do Indian
consumers because most of them do not have access to banking accounts or
conventional forms of credit. The subsidiary’s service makes it easy for these
consumers to engage in money transfers and enables them to acquire funds to pay
bills with ease.
The
New York Times article can be found at:
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/12/05/business/international/mobile-payments-gain-traction-among-indias-poor.html
For
more information on Calpian, please visit: www.calpian.com
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